Ducati is known for its pavement racing program, having won the last three manufacturers’ titles in the Superbike World Championship and the 2025 MotoGP crown. However, the Italian marque has been keen on expanding into off-road disciplines too with its Desmo450, which is currently used in the FIM Motocross World Championship and AMA Supercross.
While MXGP and Supercross are a work in progress, Ducati can proudly claim a Mint 400 overall in the meantime.
HERO Racing was a new-look team going into 2026. Despite enjoying plenty of success with Honda, team owner Giovanni Spinali felt Ducati’s 100-year anniversary was a good time to bring the Desmo450 to the desert. Ciaran Naran remained on the roster while Lyndon Snodgrass was signed as his new partner-in-crime following the departures of Shane Logan and Arturo Salas Jr. The tandem worked well in their debut at the Parker 400 in January when they finished second overall, incidentally behind Logan.
Two months later, they packed their bags for their maiden Mint 400 Motorcycle Race. After qualifying fourth, the two found themselves in battle with former Mint overall winners Dalton Shirey and Preston Campbell on Saturday.
Shirey, who recently departed Husqvarna for Kawasaki and was competing solo, was the top qualifier on Friday and quickly pulled ahead. However, Naran and Logan started to reel him in by Lap 2.
As the race progressed, the course took its toll on the leaders. Naran noted it was “really brutal, really rough. A lot of people out there so a lot of dust. Thankfully, the wind was blowing like it was. Without the wind, it would have been pretty miserable. But that’s part of off-road racing.”
Shirey had to swap out a rear tire after the spoke broke, causing his lead to evaporate, while a fuel pump issue on Lap 5 knocked Logan out of contention. After three laps, Naran traded off with Snodgrass. The latter pressed the attack on Shirey before passing him on the final lap and pulling away.
The Naran–Snodgrass duo beat Campbell by seven minutes, while Shirey settled for third and was nine minutes back.
Ducati hadn’t overalled a desert race since the 1969 Baja 500 when Doug Douglass and Jim McClurg won on a Desmo350. Jordan Graham topped the Mint 400’s inaugural Hooligan Open category in 2020 with a Scrambler Desert Sled, though that wasn’t an outright win.
“Ciaran did the first three laps and had us in a really good position,” said Snodgrass. “I jumped on the bike and put my head down and went as hard as I could, and was able to make a few passes and get up into the lead. Really good first time here at the Mint 400.”
Like Adam Householder in the Unlimited Race, the second-place finish kept Campbell from achieving an unprecedented third straight Motorcycle win. After having Ricky Brabec as his co-rider in 2025, Nolan Cate worked with Campbell at this year’s event.
Salas rode a KTM alongside Frank Pickrell and Austin Farley for the Mint. However, his race was cut short when he crashed. After a three-hour extraction process, he was airlifted to the hospital where he was diagnosed with a dislocated hip and fractured femur and back.
2026 was the first Mint to feature quads. Roberto Villalobos scored a top 20 for the four-wheelers by placing 19th, nearly 40 minutes ahead of runner-up Don Higbee in 32nd.
Among the old-school bikes, Taylor Baker repeated in 1975–1982 Sportsman Motorcycle on a 1982 Yamaha YZ250 built by vintage racing guru Norm Francis. While he felt he could’ve gone faster than the 75 mph on the dry lakebed, he was quite happy with how the Yamaha fared.
Baker quipped, “I actually feel pretty good. I’m lying to myself at this point, but I really do feel good. I’m probably going to go back out and do one more lap on a modern bike just to see if I can make myself bleed.”
Walker Bymoen’s 1976 Honda CR250M Elsinore was the 134th and final bike to complete the race and be classified. The only other rider in 1975–1982 besides Baker, he recorded a time of 7:27:37.650 over the two laps mandated for vintage bikes.
A former Army helicopter mechanic, Bymoen wasn’t the only veteran in the field. Warfighter Made oversaw the #384 of Dan Stoner, Jesse Williamson, and Alexa Barth that finished ninth in Open Amateur Motorcycle while Mitch Melott’s quad retired after one lap.
While Ducati was the first Hooligan winner, the label nowadays belongs to the Harley-Davidson Sportster as the only model allowed in Hooligan Sportsman (a Scrambler Sportsman class exists for the Ducati Scrambler and similar makes, though it hasn’t appeared at the Mint since 2023). Mark Gerloff was the division’s only rider to navigate the two laps in under four hours. Runner-up and Mint newcomer Corey Hatzfeld just missed out on the mark by four seconds, slowed down by an early crash.
Unlike the pros, Gerloff remarked the “course was fire. It was perfect. The whoops were long enough to where you were over it and then the track would open up and it was fast as hell. The Harley was eatin’.”
Class winners
| Class | Overall | Number | Rider of Record | Total Time | Laps |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1975–1982 Sportsman Motorcycle | 113 | V110 | Taylor Baker | 3:52:48.900 | 2 |
| 1983–1995 Sportsman Motorcycle | 120 | VM248 | Daniel Stinton | 4:22:29.508 | 2 |
| 399 Amateur Motorcycle | 47 | X223 | Steven Gerome | 9:01:52.593 | 5 |
| 399 Expert Motorcycle | 37 | X152 | Teddy Miller | 8:38:43.978 | 5 |
| 399 Pro Motorcycle | 38 | X1 | Allen Pollard | 8:42:23.992 | 5 |
| Adventure Bike Sportsman Motorcycle | 116 | AB69 | Jacob Rottermund | 4:08:25.197 | 2 |
| Family Expert Motorcycle | 46 | F22 | Theodore Ovrid | 8:55:47.698 | 5 |
| Hooligan Sportsman Motorcycle | 111 | H50 | Mark Gerloff | 3:37:59.701 | 2 |
| Ironman Amateur Motorcycle | 27 | O54 | Hunter Guiboa | 8:21:54.659 | 5 |
| Ironman Expert Motorcycle | 25 | O34 | Justin Lott | 8:20:16.841 | 5 |
| Ironman Pro Motorcycle | 12 | J5 | Patricio Cabrera | 9;14:32.725 | 6 |
| Lites Expert Motorcycle | 33 | K135 | Jeffrey Wells | 8:32:06.490 | 5 |
| Open Amateur Motorcycle | 23 | 351 | Richard Powell | 8:12:59.522 | 5 |
| Open Expert Motorcycle | 7 | 312 | Caleb Tate | 8:46:56.885 | 6 |
| Open Pro Motorcycle | 1 | N2 | Ciaran Naran | 7:44:26.254 | 6 |
| Over 30 Expert Motorcycle | 15 | M510 | Jeff Pickton | 7:43:52.996 | 5 |
| Over 30 Pro Motorcycle | 11 | P6 | Klayton Preece | 9:14:26.165 | 6 |
| Over 40 Expert Motorcycle | 14 | M789 | Christopher Fry | 7:40:57.217 | 5 |
| Over 50 Expert Motorcycle | 16 | M809 | Rick Mianecki | 7:44:23.840 | 5 |
| Over 60 Expert Motorcycle | 92 | M947 | Michael Boge | 9:47:28.786 | 4 |
| Quad Expert | 45 | 443 | Desi Gastelum | 8:52:57.958 | 5 |
| Quad Ironman Expert | 61 | 613 | Jake Harrison | 7:28:56.043 | 4 |
| Quad Pro | 19 | Q18 | Roberto Villalobos | 7:49:58.035 | 5 |
| Women’s Expert Motorcycle | 26 | W03 | Kimberly Loppnow | 8:20:46.818 | 5 |
Featured image credit: tanner_engen
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